Latest market data

Stock search

Keeping hungry lions from attacking farm animals in rural Africa
-- or anywhere -- is no easy feat, especially in the dark. Bright
light helps keep the fierce predators at bay, something that’s
hard to come by after the sun goes down and you live way off the
grid.

Many people in remote, impoverished areas of Africa curb lion
attacks at night using old-fashioned kerosene lamps. Often, they
walk for miles to buy the expensive fossil fuel, which belches
poisonous fumes when burned. In the short term, breathing the
toxic exhaust causes dizziness and nausea. In the long, it can
lead to blood clots that can damage the heart, brain, kidneys and
other organs.

M-KOPA Solar, a
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation -backed company based out
of Nairobi, Kenya, offers a safer, cleaner and greener solution:
a portable solar-powered lighting system that reportedly wards
off the big cats.

The lightweight solar lighting system -- outfitted with a 4-watt
solar panel, a USB multi-mobile phone charger, and three
brightness-adjustable lights -- highlights big changes on the
horizon for people in the rural areas of the world’s
second-largest continent. Namely, the proliferation of technology
in regions where billions struggle to simply survive and our
iPhones and Pebbles seem useless.

The M-KOPA Solar technology may be more affordable than kerosene,
but it’s still not inexpensive for those who need it most.

M-KOPA customers pay 40 Kenyan shillings (about 45 cents) per day
to use it, after making a 2,500-shilling ($28.38) deposit. That’s
relatively steep, considering that most households in Kenya earn
less than $2 per day,
according to M-KOPA.

Pay-as-you go payments are processed via an embedded mobile SIM
card, which, unfortunately, M-KOPA can use to remotely kill the
lights if a customer falls behind on payments.

For this much-needed technology to reach widespread adoption in
East Africa and beyond, the price has to go down. For now, only
those who can afford it reap its benefits.